What Never Should Have Been
by Linda Atkinson
Summary: Supernatural AU where John doesn't die and Dean and Sam have a normal life growing up, but with a catch. Dean learns the hard way again. GEN
1. Chapter 1

What Should Have Never Been

Author: Linda Atkinson

Fandom: Supernatural

Rating: FRT

Characters: Sam, Dean, John, OCs

Warnings: Completely AU after What Is and What Should Never Be, violence, angst,

Drug-use, abuse, Evil Sam(maybe)

Summary: Dean is so shaken by events in What Is and What Should Have Been that he makes a deal with the cross-roads demon to change the past so that his father doesn't become a hunter and ends up in a alternate world where things are radically different, except that he alone can remember the original time-line.

Many thanks to Sioux_Sioux for her beta and assistance on the story.

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The hotel room was quiet except for the rattling hum of the air conditioner. Dean rolled over staring at the bed on the opposite side of the room. He could just make out the man-shape bundle that was his brother swathed in blankets despite the suffocating heat. With a sigh Dean fumbled the covers off and staggered to the half-size refrigerator under the window pulling out a plastic bottle of water.

He regarded his own bed with all the enthusiasm of man digging his own grave. Instead Dean flopped down into one of the wooden framed upholstered chairs shoved around the small round table beside the fridge. He lifted the water bottle noticing, not for the first time, that his hand was shaking. Of course, he had lost a lot of blood at the djinn's hands.

He wondered if that was the sole reason for his continued unease.

Sam had saved his ass, dragged Dean out of his comatose state and set him firmly back into reality. The only problem was that his reality wasn't any better than the damned nightmare world the genie had created. Seeing his Dad's happy smiling face, if only in that dream state, reinforced in Dean the gaping hole in his life that his father's death had left. Dean sighed. It was odd that the djinn could give him his mother but not his father, as if Dean was to always be denied his family, whole and intact. Either one or another, but never both.

After he had settled down enough to realize that the things he saw were not really another life, a do-over on reality, Dean had come to the conclusion that his father's absence affected him more than his mother's death. It was harsh but true. Dean had had his mother for four years his father had been there all his life. What did it say about him that if he had to choose he wanted his father back? But, and this was a big one, he wanted the happy smiling man in the softball uniform and the silly Santa hat, not the hard, stone-cold killer that his father had become in the end. Dean could never forgive his father for making that deal. How could a man be so cold that he would consign his own soul to hell to save his son, when that son couldn't live without him?

All these thoughts kept streaking through Dean's mind, crashing into his consciousness, sending him spiraling down into depression. Sam couldn't understand, he didn't have the frame of reference. He never understood Dad not the way Dean had. He didn't have those happy memories of an all too brief time of normalcy, of a happy loving father, and a warm, caring mother who were all things to one little boy. Dean felt the bitter sting of tears and he scrubbed a hand over his eyes. He knew he couldn't have that back, somewhere in the back of his mind Dean realized that his mother was lost to him, but Dad? He could get his father back; he just had to craft the deal well enough.

Sitting up straight Dean sighed; he fingered the water bottle tracing his thumb lightly over the spout. His father had taught Dean how to hustle pool and cards and run credit card scams. John Winchester was a con artist extraordinaire. He had taught his older son that Winchester Hustle, and Dean could sing and dance with the best of them. All he had to do was beat that red-eyed bitch at her own game.

Sighing, Dean rose and ambled back over to his bed. He'd craft the deal right, make it air tight. Make sure that she couldn't screw him on this one. Demons weren't any smarter than humans in the long run. All he had to do was think about this, take his time. He had one shot and he wasn't going to screw this up by going off half-cocked. Sam rolled over in his sleep and Dean held his breath wondering, briefly, if Sam could hear his thoughts. This was something his brother really didn't need to be involved with.

Still it was two weeks before Dean decided that he had the terms of the deal settled enough in his own mind that the demon couldn't mess with his head. They had pulled into Barstow, California, three hours ago, on a bogus hunt that Dean had told Sam about and insisted that they handle, despite his brother's eye rolling and bitching about the drive.

He wasn't sure why he had insisted that they needed to come to California, only that in his mind this was the place he wanted the deal to go down. He had parked Sam at the Motel Six just off the freeway exit ramp and they had done take-out for dinner. Then Dean made an off hand remark about hustling up some action, pool or otherwise, and here he was, the intersection of Dead and End Streets.

The cement tilt-up structures were bare and ugly in the sickly orange glow of the sodium lights. It might be midnight but with CalEd on the job it was never dark. Rubbing a hand over his eyes again Dean dropped to his knees and scratched out a trench in the hard, clay earth. As soon as the photograph was buried in the dirt Dean hobbled to his feet, not trusting the demon to not just pop up behind him. His Dad had drilled into his head at an early age, "Always watch your back, son."

Dean took him to heart.

"Come on, come on. I ain't got all night, sister," Dean snapped, then flinched as a cool breeze ruffled his hair. He stepped back, pacing a few feet away from the gouge in the earth looking intently at the intersection. And was still surprised when a hand fell on his shoulder.

"Shit, do you have to do that?"

Cocking her head she grinned at him.

"Well, girls just wanna have fun."

Rolling his eyes Dean sighed.

"Do I have really have to tell you why I'm here?"

"Oh come on, just for old time's sake."

"I wanna make a deal," he said simply, and she nodded, encouraging him to speak with her soft doe eyes and slinky smile.

"Some poor sucker got a little lost wifey?" the demon asked, twirling her finger against the front of his shirt. Dean looked down then shot her a glare.

"Oh I see; here on a more personal basis?"

"I want…" Dean began but she interrupted him with a giggle and a flourish of one slender hand. She hummed a phrase of music then whispered,

"So I want to warn you laddie, though I know that you're perfectly swell. That my heart belongs to Daddy, 'cause my Daddy, he treats me so well…" she leered, making the words sound so much more vulgar than they were meant to be. "Oh poor Dean, does his little broken heart still belong to Daddy?"

It took every ounce of strength that he had not to toss holy water on the bitch, but that would only piss her off, so he swallowed his anger and smiled. That made her pause. He felt a brief rush of pride at knocking her off her game, and his grin went from pained to genuine. She narrowed her eyes.

Dean took a step forward, no longer overwhelmed; let her say what she wanted, as long as he got his deal. He brushed a hand across her cheek, and she took a step back. With a grimace the demon waved an impatient hand.

"So get on with it."

All trace of humor had left her face and, for Dean, that was almost as satisfying as getting what he came for.

"I want to make a deal, well that's sort of a given isn't it?"

"Just cut the small talk, Deano…" she paused, as if waiting to see if that was going to hit its mark, but his father hadn't called him that in so long that it was a moot point. He smiled just as smoothly as if she was a pick-up in a bar.

"I want my Dad, alive again. And I want it so that he can never make that deal with the yellow-eyed demon, never goes to Hell. In fact, I want it so that he never was a hunter at all. Me and Sam grow up in a normal house, Sammy gets to go to college and I do whatever the hell I do."

"Okay, so that can be done. Of course, you realize that all the people that you and your father saved over the years are going to die. This affects so many more lives that just the three of you."

"I know, I kinda dealt with that already, but that isn't necessarily true. We aren't the only hunters out there. Some of them will be helped by other hunters. The rest I don't care about right now."

Her smile was almost blinding.

"I just have one further little stipulation. You'll have to remember this time-line when you move into the other reality, but it does have an upside for you Deano. The Dean that you are replacing will pay your debt here. I get his soul; can you condemn an innocent man to Hell?"

"Hey, if he's another me, he's no innocent. You can have him."

"Just remember that little phrase, 'be careful what you wish for'."

She winked then leaned forward. Dean bent down wrapping his hand around her head, fingers raking through her hair. He squeezed her neck gently, pressing his lips to hers and she opened for him. They stood pressed together for a long time, Dean holding her close to him when she tried to pull away. Finally, she shoved him back.

"Oh you'd better hit the road, Dean. Sammy and Daddy are waiting for you in Palto Alto. Don't be late; Sammy gets a little cranky when he has to deal with the old man without his enforcer."

Dean didn't stop to think about what that might mean. With a grin he strolled to the Impala and stood glancing back at the empty intersection. He thought that he might feel dizziness or some kind of disorientation when the time-line shifted, but apparently the demon world was fresh out of 'speshul FXs'. Dean laughed flipping his keys in the air and walking back to the trunk of the car.

His duffle bag was tossed in the trunk, and that was odd because he distinctly remembered leaving it in the Motel Six in Barstow with Sammy. But that was then, this was now. He pawed through the trunk looking over the contents. A first-aid kit, plastic and white, still swathed in shrink-wrap, as if it had never been used. A box with some road flares, a can of Fix a Flat, and a toolbox that had a ratchet set and a can of WD-40, shoved on top of some greasy, oil-stained tools, but no false bottom, no shot-gun, no holy water, no hunting paraphernalia at all. He smiled, better and better.

Closing his eyes Dean walked around to the driver's door and slid behind the wheel. The demon had said that Sam and his father were in Palo Alto, and that was a bit odd. Why had his Dad relocated to Palo Alto? Maybe when Sammy got into Stanford the old man had been so happy he had moved the whole clan to California. Well, that was a new twist on the situation, and one that Dean was more than happy with, although she had said that Sammy didn't like dealing with their father without Dean so maybe things weren't so copasetic after all. Still, Sam and Dad living together had one operative word in it, _living _as in both _alive._

Dean smiled turning the engine over and cranking the music up. He bypassed the side streets leading to the hotel and hit the interstate all the way to the California coast. The sun was just rising when the Impala pulled off the Pacific Coast Highway and Dean rolled into a Denny's parking lot. He needed a cup of coffee, and he had been half way to the city when Dean realized he had no idea where they lived.

He was debating just looking up Sam or his Dad's name in the phonebook when his cell phone rang. Dean pulled it out of his pocket and flicked it on happily slurping his coffee just to annoy his younger brother.

Sam sounded annoyed, more than annoyed, he sounded pissed off, and that took some of the cheer out of Dean's morning. Frowning he nodded at the waitress as she topped him off and then sighed into the phone.

"Sammy, what's up my man?"

"Dean, you were supposed to be back yesterday. Where the hell are you? You know that he's difficult to deal with when you're not here. I mean the whole reason that I support your lazy ass is that you can keep Dad in line. If you're not going to do that I don't need either of you here. You can do what you like and he can go back…"

"Whoa big fella," Dean said with a grin, so Sammy and Dad were going a few rounds. He'd take it any day. "I'm almost home. I drove all night and I had to pull off and get some coffee before I drove right into the big blue ocean."

Sam sighed. "Okay, it's just that I have a final this week, and Sara is running herself ragged trying to deal with Dad and the baby."

Dean blinked, Baby? Well, hell where had that come from? He almost said something like that outloud then clamped his lips shut. Sara? Hadn't that chick Sam had been dating been named Jess? Who the hell was Sara?

"Don't panic little bro, I'm on my way." Dean clicked the phone off then gave himself a mental kick in the ass, but it would have sounded funny if he had added, "Oh, by the way Sam, where do we live?"

He settled for star 69ing Sam's number then hoping that he was calling from the house and not his cell. He lucked out, the number popped up on the screen when he grabbed the phonebook. Quickly Dean flipped through the pages until his finger landed on Samuel Winchester, the number and an address. Ripping the page out of the book, Dean headed out to the parking lot.

The house that Dean pulled up in front of was huge, at least five bedrooms, nicely landscaped and in a good neighborhood. He smiled; Dad must have done really well for himself for them to land in this kind of place. Dean pulled the Impala up in the driveway beside a nice four door sedan, something sensible that he was sure belonged to Sam. Then he glanced around looking for his father's pick-up, but there was no other vehicle in sight. Maybe Dad was out.

Dean tugged his keys out of the ignition and retrieved his bag from the trunk. There was a house key on his key ring and Dean opened the front door.

The front room was spacious, airy and beautifully decorated. In fact it looked like something he had once seen in a magazine ad. The hardwood floors were spotlessly clean, and the overstuffed furniture looked immaculate and barely used. The place was kind of a let down for him. It felt more like a museum than a home, but considering some of the places they had lived as kids Dean wasn't going to complain.

A harried looking tall blond woman carrying a baby in her arms appeared around the corner and she smiled.

"Oh Dean you're home."

"Yeah uh…Sara, I'm sorry that I'm late. Sammy called me and said that he was having trouble with Dad."

She frowned. "Well you know how it is. You're the only one that can keep him in line. Sam just doesn't have your way with John."

Sam appeared in the hallway frowning at his brother.

"God, I'm glad you're back. You know it's your job to make sure he stays in line. It's why you're here and he's not at Clearview. He's in his room, come on. He hasn't been cooperating with me or Sara and he needs to take his meds."

Dean felt his stomach clench.

"Did he get hurt?"

"No Dean, it's really fortunate he didn't get out and cause a fuss. He just won't take his meds. You get them in him, whatever way you usually do. And get him cleaned up for lunch."

A sudden sense of dread fell on Dean. That didn't sound good. But he followed his brother down the hall to a closed door. Sam didn't bother knocking he just pushed into the room. Dean followed. The bedroom was neat, almost fanatically clean. Tall dresser with a frilly looking fern of some kind on the top, a large bed, rumpled but clean, with two nightstands and a small desk pushed against the far wall.

There was a large bay window with a really nice view of the yard and the street, on the other wall and a chair was pushed in front of it. Dean stumbled to a halt. Seated in the chair was his father, hair a bit longer than Dean remembered him ever wearing it, but still thick and dark, curling around the collar of the blue cotton pajamas he was wearing.

"Dad," Sam snapped and the figure in the chair flinched at the sound of his voice. Dean frowned again. "Dad, Dean is here, and you are going to behave yourself and take these pills or he'll make you."

For the first time Dean noticed that his brother was carrying a paper cup in one hand and a bottle of water in the other. He shoved both at his older brother then stormed to the chair.

John cringed again when Sam tugged at him arm, and then he rose silently coming to stand beside his older son. Dean looked at his father aghast. John was thinner than he had been in the other life, but he was not as weather-beaten his skin smooth and free from damage from too many years spent in dark smoky bars. But he had a black eye and split lip. When he looked up at Dean there was a definite hint of fear in his face.

"Dad," Dean said, but John shrank back.

"You're not him, not my Dean. Where is my son?"

Sam looked angry and turned to his brother.

"See, this is what we've been putting up with all weekend. He keeps saying that Dean is gone somewhere else. The same crazy bullshit he's been spouting for years."

Sam turned back to their father.

"Take your pills, Dad."

He nudged Dean's arm and Dean held the cup out to their father. John looked at Sam and then back at Dean.

"No, I don't need it. I'm not crazy. Tell him you're not my Dean. You're somebody else's Dean."

"Dad," Sam said grabbing John's wrist. "Take the damn pills."

With a snarl Sam jerked their father's arm and the older man winced. Dean could see the line of bruises ringing John's wrist. John tried to pull away and Sam slapped him hard across the face. The cut on his lip opened and blood dribbled down John's chin.

Dean jerked back, horrified, when John cringed and cowered into the corner. Sam pulled him out again and raised a hand.

"Look Dean it's your reasonability to take care of him. Get the damn pills in him." Turning back to their father he snapped, "Do you want to go back to Clearview, Dad?"

"No Sammy, please. I'll take the pills."

John carefully accepted the cup from Dean and obediently swallowed several capsules in it. He choked a bit on the water and ended up dribbling bloody fluid onto his pajama shirt, but the pills stayed down.

With a snort Sam turned and stalked out the door, he whirled in the hallway jerking his chin in John's direction.

"Get him in clean clothes. Uncle Roger and Aunt Carol are coming for lunch, and I want him presentable."

"Hey, Dad," Dean began but John pulled away from him frowning. The pills must have been strong because they were beginning to affect him already and John looked a bit disorientated. "Dad, come on in the bathroom, and let's get that cut taken care of."

His hand was shaking again and Dean tried to ignore it as he surveyed the interior of the small en suite bathroom in John's room. The porcelain counter was immaculate, and held a brush and electric razor, although his father looked like he hadn't shaven in a week. Dean pulled one of the thick white wash clothes off the rack on the sink and ran cold water over it. Pressing the cloth to John's lip he tried not to notice that this father trembled beneath his touch. If Sammy had beaten John it might account for some of John's discomfort. Dean set that thought aside for now, concentrating on stopping the bleeding, it was something he was all too familiar with, and his father settled down after a minute.

"Did you take a shower this morning?" he asked and John nodded listlessly. "How about some clean clothes?"

He tugged on John's arm and his father followed along silently. Quickly Dean went through the closet and came up with a blue chambray work shirt and a pair of jeans. His father began silently stripping off the soiled pajama shirt and Dean turned offering him the work shirt. He hissed in surprise as he caught sight of the bruises on John's side and back, ugly, dark purple marks of a recent beating.

John hung his head, cheeks pink with shame, but he accepted the clean shirt and hustled into it without help. Dean sighed as he handed the jeans to his father and turned to walk across the room, but John merely shimmied out of his pajama bottoms as if Dean wasn't there and tugged the jeans on. There were more bruises on one leg and Dean was really angry at Sam now. How could his brother have done this to their father when the man was obviously ill?

When Dean turned around again John was fumbling with the sleeves of his shirt, trying to roll them up and failing. Dean stepped forward and John held out an arm complacently. It hurt Dean to watch a man who had moved with such deadly grace and precision unable to even cuff his own sleeves.

The doorbell rang when Dean and John walked down the hall from the bedroom to the kitchen. Sara hurried through the house smiling broadly at the middle-aged man and women a few years older than their father. Dean remembered them vaguely, he remembered the big bluff man at his mother's funeral, and the screaming fight they had had with his father a few months later. That was just before Child Protective Services had shown up at the hotel they were staying in, just before they left Lawrence the first time.

Apparently though, in this time-line, Uncle Roger and Aunt Carol had played a more important part in their lives and Dean felt uneasy about it. Sam's wife, his sister-in-law, Dean supposed, ushered the couple inside. They smiled coolly at Dean and looked right through his father. That pissed Dean off, but he kept quiet. Aunt Carol reached for the baby in Sara's arms.

"How's grandma's girl," she cooed. Turning, Carol held the baby up to Roger and smiled. "Look, honey she's getting so big."

Roger took the baby and bouncing her, she giggled. "That's grandpa's little lady, yes she is."

John stiffened. "She's not your granddaughter, she's mine. You took my sons you're not taking her too."

Dean frowned at that. He clearly remembered Uncle Roger and Aunt Carol coming to the hotel to talk to their father and the almost knock-down, drag-out fight that resulted in. He remembered their Dad practically throwing their things into boxes and packing the Impala. But in this reality something had happened, they hadn't gotten away. He desperately wanted to find out what happened. He wasn't sure he could ask his father, as drugged-up as the man was, anything he said was suspect. There had to be someone he could ask.

The uncomfortable silence began to grate on Dean and he patted his father's arm.

"Come on Dad, let's go see if we can scout up Sammy for lunch."

John cocked his head then nodded, casting one last glare at the couple beside the door. Dean could hear the murmured voices behind them. Roger's angry bluster.

"You should talk Sam into putting him back in the institution, and kicking that older boy's lazy ass out of here."

The resignation in Sara's voice convinced Dean that she had approached his brother about that very subject, many times.

"Sam won't Uncle Roger, you know how much he loves his brother and he'd never put John in Clearview again, not after the incident last year."

Dean frowned, incident? He hadn't been here more than two hours and he was beginning to hate the name Clearview. Quickly he tugged John into the dining room. His father let Dean lead him by the hand, and Dean ran his fingertips over the skin of the older man's wrist. Suddenly he stopped, turning John's hands over palm up. John didn't pull away even when Dean ran his fingers over the raised red scars that ran across both wrists. He flinched, horrified that his father had tried to commit suicide.

"Awwww, Dad why?" he whispered not really expecting an answer, but John looked at him shuddering as he tried to put his thoughts into words.

"I didn't, she did it. She made it look like it was me, but she did it. She's one of them you know," John said looking over his shoulder at the young woman cradling the baby in her arms.

Dean cast a glance at the people in the hallway.

"One of them? You mean Sara? She's one of what?"

John leaned forward letting his eyes slip closed, "A demon."

TBC


	2. Chapter 2

What Should Have Never Been Pt 2

Author: Linda Atkinson

Fandom: Supernatural

Rating: FRT

Characters: Sam, Dean, John, OCs

Warnings: Completely AU after What Is and What Should Never Be, some rough language, violence, angst, Drug-use, abuse, Evil Sam(maybe).

Note: I have no knowledge of Freudian Psychology. Everything the doctor says I just made up. If you have actually studied Freud just go with me on this one.

Summary: Dean is so shaken by events in What Is and What Should Have Been that he makes a deal with the cross-roads demon to change the past so that his father doesn't become a hunter and ends up in a alternate world where things are radically different, except that he alone can remember the original time-line.

Thanks to Sioux_Sioux for the beta and input on the story.

The house was quiet; Dean could hear the low murmuring of night sounds outside. The chirp of crickets, the barking of a dog down the street, gentle sounds of talk and laughter from the couple in the house next door. It all seemed surreal. Of course, it was all surreal to Dean. He remembered how it had been before. He remembered the succession of shabby hotels and cheap rentals of growing up. Of Dad leaving them with Pastor Jim or Bobby Singer or a dozen other hunters he knew well enough to trust with his children when they were too young to stay alone. He remembered the weekends without Dad when he was old enough to watch Sammy in some out of the way dump where the neighbors were not too curious. This beautiful house was about as far from those places as Oz had been from Dorothy's family farm. A sweet, mocking voice rang in his head.

"Well, you sure ain't in Kansas anymore, Deano."

God, why did his conscience always sound like her?

Pushing the comforter off Dean slid out of bed. The hall was bathed in a soft yellow light, a tiny nightlight, like the one that Sammy had plugged in beside his bed wherever they went was glowing at one end of the hall. Dean supposed it was in case Dad got out of bed at night and went into the hall.

The door to his father's room was open, couldn't be locked as a matter of fact. Dean had checked; at least they didn't lock in him at night. But when he ducked his head around the corner he could see his father asleep draped in a quilt. For one horrible moment a vivid image of his father's blanket wrapped corpse popped into Dean's head, and he closed his eyes trying hard to banish it.

Quietly he walked into the room and settled on the edge of the bed. John was sleeping curled onto one side and he jerked rolling over onto his back when Dean sat down. John flinched, and Dean was once again horrified at the look of fear that crossed his father's face.

John blinked sleepily.

"I didn't do anything."

"I know, Dad. I just wanted to see how you were doing," Dean said hesitantly.

John looked confused as if that wasn't something he heard very often. He sat up and Dean patted his arm. John looked down, clearly confused.

"Do you need something, Dean?"

"No Dad, I just wanted to see you, that's all."

John bit his lip worriedly.

"Did Sammy send you in here? Because I didn't do anything."

"I know that Dad, I'm sorry that I woke you. Why don't you go back to sleep, okay? I'll see you in the morning."

John looked confused again as if he was trying to pull up a memory, then he surrendered and lay back down. Dean sat beside him for a minute, made all the more uneasy by the wariness in his father's face. Finally, Dean gave up and rose.

He padded silently through the house to the kitchen. He hit the light switch, and the room was bathed in bright fluorescent light. Dean made a quick but thorough search of the room noting that one of the drawers had a lock installed on it, presumably a knife drawer, as if his Dad couldn't be trusted with sharp objects.

The other drawers held a variety of cooking implements, and pots. The pantry was neatly organized and well stocked. Someone in the house liked to cook. Well it had better not be him, because Dean was sure that was one thing that was going to change pretty damn quick.

The upper cabinets held dishes. The ones they had used yesterday for lunch and dinner along with a china case and nicer dishes for special occasions. He spent a long time searching through the cabinets but came up with nothing. Finally, in one small side cabinet near the sink Dean found four pill bottles, brown plastic containers with white safety lids and white labels. All four bottles bore his father's name, and he carried them over to the phone desk pulling out a pad of paper. Quickly he scribbled the name of the doctor who prescribed the medication and the name of the drugs themselves.

Ripping the page off the pad Dean went back to his room. Settling back in the bed he made up his mind that he was going to get some answers. This was not the life that Dean had bargained for, but it was one he was determined to make better. He, Sammy and Dad were alive, if not well, and Dean could work with that.

After breakfast Dean settled into the den at the 'family' computer and began researching the name Clearview. It didn't take long for an image to pop up on the screen. He scrolled through the entries and found one for Clearview Mental Institution, in Palo Alto, California. The photographs on the webpage were of a large white building surrounded by a wide expanse of green lawn and a long curving driveway lined with stately oak trees. He smiled grimly, the place tried to dress itself up but there was no disguising the metal bars on the window; a pretty prison was still a prison.

Dean carefully wrote the address and phone number for the institution on a sheet of paper, just like he would in any other job. Then he clicked back to Google and searched for the name of the doctor who had written John's prescriptions and, what do you know, the doctor was on staff at good old Clearview.

Dean quickly gathered up the project he had started working on last night. He checked the envelope he had carefully concealed in a drawer and pulled out the cardstock and laminating paper he had liberated from Sam's study. He had spent forty-five minutes the night before hustling his father into the den and taking pictures with Sam's brand new digital camera. John had not wanted to cooperate, but he had managed to get several good head shots of his father, and make the older man take some of him. He had also retrieved an accordion folder from the glove compartment of the Impala and scanned in his driver's license and social security card. He had spent some time working up phony IDs for both himself and John. Now he pulled up the seal of the state of California and began working on another badge. Another ID for himself.

Researching the medications themselves was a bit more time consuming, but his Dad had made sure that both Sam and Dean had a good grasp of Latin and that did aid in researching medical terms. He checked the first name, Seroqeul. It turned out to be an anti-psychotic drug for the treatment of schizophrenia. Dean frowned; rubbing a hand over his eyes, one of the side effects of the drug was sedation. That explained why his Dad was so listless most of the time. He checked the second name on his list, Klonopin, which turned out to be an anti-seizure medication. The other two medications were for high blood pressure and stomach problems.

He glared down at the computer screen, anti-psychotic and anti-seizure medications, what the hell had they done to his father?

There was a noise behind him and Dean quickly hit the back button on the computer bringing up the news. Sara smiled at him as she began loading the breakfast dishes into the dishwasher. He heard the sound of a vacuum cleaner in the other room and went out. His father was, more or less, vacuuming the rugs in the living room. It was a sort of hit and miss proposition but they really didn't look like they needed it anyway. He glanced up at his sister-in-law as she passed and she shrugged.

"It keeps him out of trouble."

Dean frowned again, she sounded like she was talking about an errant five year old child, not John Winchester. He leaned against the doorframe watching silently. His Dad flipped the clearer's cord over his shoulder and moved toward the largest of the three rugs. He turned and the cord wrapped around his neck. Suddenly John's hand went up and he made a distressed half-strangled sound.

Dean leapt forward, but stumbled to a halt. He could clearly see the cord plugged into an outlet, and there was enough slack in it that the length wrapped across John's shoulders so it should not be tight. Dean took two steps into the room, and watched in mute horror as the cord tightened, as if pulled by unseen hands. Quickly he grabbed the cord and it immediately went slack in his hands falling away from his father's body. Dean glanced at the outlet, and saw Sara standing in the doorway. She finally summoned a smile.

"Is he alright?"

With a causal grin Dean flicked the cord enough to pull it out of the outlet. She frowned but didn't say anything. Pulling his father along after him Dean dodged past her and dragged John into the den.

"Yeah, he's fine, he just got it caught around his neck."

John looked at him.

"I didn't…she…"

Dean cut him off with a harsh glare.

"Not now Dad."

John shut up immediately without so much as an inkling of an argument. He sat down on the sofa, shooting Dean a wounded glare. Dean felt like crap. Sara reappeared with the baby and a bottle. She brushed past Dean and offered the blanket wrapped infant to his father.

"Would you like to give Annie her bottle, John?"

The closest thing to a real smile that Dean had seen broke across John's face. He carefully took the baby and held the bottle to her tiny bow of a mouth. She took the nipple easily and John did what Dean called the Mommy bounce rocking her gently.

A sudden cold memory wrapped itself around Dean's mind, a day not too long after 'that night' of his Dad desperately trying to soothe a wailing Sammy who was screaming from hunger because he didn't want to take the bottle his father was trying to offer. At the time Dean didn't understand that it had meant that his mother was breastfeeding and Sam wasn't accustomed to a bottle, but now he knew.

Dean slid onto the sofa beside his father waiting quietly until Sara was off on another of her daily chores. He watched his father's big hands deftly handling the tiny body, as he had watched before. Looking up at the man Dean wondered how had things gone so wrong.

Looking around to be certain that his sister-in-law was nowhere to be found he got John's attention by patting his arm.

"Dad, what happened? How did we end up like this?"

John shrugged.

"I don't know. It's been so long now. But I'm glad you're not him. Not my Dean. You're a better man than he was. I can tell."

Dean smiled, hearing those words meant so much to him. He leaned against his father just a bit, just like he did when he was little, but John was not a stout as 'his' father had been and he couldn't take much of Dean's weight.

"Why do you say that?"

John shot him a look as if that should have been as plain as day.

"You've been here two days now, and you haven't hit me once."

The spit dried in Dean's mouth and he felt a pain in his chest sharp enough that he thought his heart might stop beating. All this time, he thought that Sam had hurt their father, all this time he had thought that John might be in danger from the others, but now. Closing his eyes Dean heard the demons' mocking voice slide through his brain.

"Sammy doesn't like dealing with the old man without his enforcer."

The horrible truth finally reared its ugly head. Sam wasn't the one beating their father, he was.

John calmly finished giving the baby her bottle then draped the light blanket over his shoulder to burp her. She was sleepy, and his father rocked her gently a little. He glanced over at Dean.

"Do you want to…" John indicated the baby in his arms. Dean blanched.

"No, its okay. Not my thing really." He smiled at his father and the two men sat quietly side by side, with the baby sleeping peacefully in John's arms. The mood was broken when Sara appeared at the den door carrying a paper cup and a bottle of water. She handed them to Dean then collected the baby.

"John, time for your medication."

Dean looked at the cup then smiled at the young woman.

"Why don't you put the baby down for her nap. I'll get the meds in him."

He could see the frown on his father's face but Sara just took Annie and left. Dean picked the pills out of the cup. He handed the blood pressure pill and the stomach medicine to John and the water. John swallowed them down then Dean looked at the other two pills. He flipped the seizure medication out and handed it to his father as well. John accepted it, and watched carefully as Dean dropped the other pill into the garbage can. His eyes went wide.

"Dad, listen to me very carefully 'cause I'm hoping that you're not psychotic. But I need you be careful what you tell Sam and Sara, okay? No more saying that I'm not your Dean, because I am, okay? I'm your son now, your Dean."

"Okay," John whispered. "You're my Dean."

"Good and I'm going to make sure that you're my Dad again too."

The next morning John was sitting on the den floor on a blanket with Annie. She was just old enough to try flipping over from her stomach to her back. Right now she was lying on her back beneath some kind of brightly colored plastic frame with a number of colorful plastic toys hanging down on ribbons. Dean thought it was the perfect thing for strangling a kid, but he supposed when they got big enough to sit up you got rid of the contraption. The TV was tuned to some kind of kiddie show with loud music and muppets. Dean smiled he wasn't sure who was watching it more, the baby or his Dad.

But John seemed clearer this morning, and when Dean brought the cup with his pills in his father only put up a token argument, just enough to satisfy Sam and Sara. Once again Dean palmed the Seroqeul.

After lunch Sara appeared with his father in tow, the baby in a large stroller and a diaper bag. She looked at Dean.

"John seems to be in a good mood today so we're going to the shopping center down the street for a haircut. Do you want to come, or would you like a little free time."

Dean smiled at her.

"Actually, I have an errand to run, is that okay? I'll be back in a couple of hours."

She nodded.

"Fine. Just be home before Sam get's back from work. He's tired at the end of the day, and your father and he just don't get along."

"Yeah, no surprises there," Dean sighed. "I'll be back."

After they had left Dean dressed in a suit and gathered up the IDs he had made, dropping all but one in the glove compartment of the car. He fastened the badge to his jacket pocket and looked at the map he had printed off.

There was a huge wrought iron gate at the end of the driveway of the Clearview Institution. Dean picked up the phone and punched in the number for the operator. When a voice came on the other end he said,

"Hi I'm Jerry Porter from Adult Protective Services here to see a Doctor Harry Odell."

The doctor met him in the foyer of the main building. Dean shook his hand looking the other man over. Doctor Odell was mid-sixties so he had probably been at the institution for a while now. He made a perfunctory glance at Dean's ID and then pulled a thick manila folder from under his arm.

"Mr. Porter, I'm pleased to meet you, but I am sorry to hear that there is a need for your services. I had always thought that John should stay here."

Dean took the folder and followed the older man down the hall.

"Why is that Doctor Odell?"

"Well, you'll see in the case files. John is a stubborn man, and he's always been in denial about his mental illness. That can cause some friction when family members try to deal with the patient."

"And you think that sets the stage for abuse?"

"Well, I never saw anything, but it's my understanding that John has two sons and I only met the one. I don't know about the older boy."

Dean smiled. "He probably loves his father very much and would anything for him."

The doctor shot him a funny look, but shrugged.

"The younger one paid for everything. I know that much. I think he's a law clerk at Dunham and Young, and in law school at Stanford. Anyway, the case is pretty well outlined in the files. All my notes are transcribed and typed for convenience. You know what they say about a doctor's hand writing."

Dean nodded smiling tightly.

"What was your personal experience with John, was he violent or aggressive? Why do you think he did it?"

"I don't know but the delusions were an on-going problem. It was almost as if John picked these things up from someone else. They read like a movie plot sometimes. Stories he'd come up with of him and the older boy, Dean, hunting. Not just hunting mind you but these horrible things, ghosts...uhh…vengeful spirits John used to call them. And the meds never really worked, we had him on many different kinds and the delusions and hallucinations never went away."

"What kind of delusions?"

"Oh mostly killing, but never people. Oh no…always some kind of mythical monsters; ghosts, werewolves, demons. Some of them were very detailed and very specific. For instance killing a ghost in white…"

"A woman in white," Dean provided. The doctor glanced at him,

"Yes, a woman in white in Jericho, California. Or a female vampire or even some demon girl named Meg."

"Seems like a pattern…"

"Well yes, typical Freudian associations between sex and death. I think it was just that John could never reconcile his masturbatory fantasies of women other than his late wife."

Dean flinched; masturbation and Dad, there were two words that he hoped never collided in his brain again…ever. Taking a deep breath he followed the doctor to a small conference room. Once the older man was gone he opened the file and began reading.

Dean had a headache by the time he was finished with the first portion of the file, and he was seething mad; at the State of California, at Sam and Uncle Roger and Aunt Carol.

Apparently in this reality his Dad hadn't realized that Roger, his own wife's brother was about to stab him in the back. At least not in time. Dean remembered their hurried departure from Lawrence, right after his Dad's last visit to Missouri Mosley. And his resulting first hunt, a quick salt and burn in the Lawrence Memorial Gardens.

He read through the doctor's notes and attached police reports becoming angrier as he went along. They had gotten away in his time-line. His Dad had done the job and returned to the hotel before his brother-in-law showed up. In this reality, he and Sammy had been tucked up in bed asleep and Roger had shown up before John finished that first job, not after.

Their uncle was wary of John's stories that something unnatural had happened to Mary. That she was pinned on the ceiling and a dark figure had been in the nursery, a dark figure with glowing yellow eyes. In his reality Dean remembered that Dad had kept it to himself, accepted what he was told, kept quiet. Here, that hadn't happened. Getting caught desecrating a grave really hadn't helped his case either.

His father had been certified insane and committed to an institution in Lawrence at his uncle's request. Roger and Carol had been awarded custody of Dean and Sam as their closest relatives and Roger had also become John's conservator, making medical and legal decisions on his behalf. They had transferred John to Clearview a few years later when Roger and Carol relocated to California. Apparently the state had insisted that John be kept close enough that the boys could visit him as a stipulation for granting his aunt and uncle sole custody of Sam and Dean.

Dean skimmed through the records quickly, not understanding much of the medical mumbo-jumbo until he got to a part that made his blood run cold. John had been diagnosed as schizophrenic. And he had been given convulsive shock therapy. Slamming his fist on the table Dean slapped the file closed. They had goddamn electrocuted his father. That explained the anti-seizure meds.

Glancing at his watch Dean saw that he had been here for an hour. Sara was alone with his Dad, and while he didn't think she'd try anything that couldn't be conveniently explained away, particularly when no one else was with his father, Dean didn't want to be gone too long. Added to that was the fact that Sam would be home for dinner soon, and he wanted to be there on time. Now that Dean had a plan, of sorts, he couldn't afford for Sammy to kick him out of the house, and lose access to their father.

Dean deposited the file with the front desk and walked out to his car. It was a short drive back to the house and Dean pulled in just as Sammy's car hit the driveway. Smiling he draped an arm around his brother's shoulders and squeezed. Sam relaxed under the touch, smiling at his brother.

"How'd it go today? Everything okay? You know I don't mean to get so riled up, but with school and work it gets a little hectic. I forget how easy it is for you with Dad."

"Yeah, I know. He's doing really good today. Went for a haircut with Sara, and took care of the baby."

True enough when they got into the house John looked more like himself than he had since Dean got there. He seemed to be focusing better and was helping put things on the table for dinner. Sara glanced from Sam to Dean, and for a minute Dean thought that she looked annoyed.

Sam actually smiled at John.

"Hey, Dad. You're looking good today."

John shrugged.

"I feel good, Sammy. How was the office?"

They sat around the dinner table talking, and laughing and for once Dean felt satisfied that everything was going to be okay.

TBC


	3. Chapter 3

What Should Have Never Been Pt 3

Author: Linda Atkinson

Fandom: Supernatural

Rating: FRT

Characters: Sam, Dean, John, OCs

Warnings: Completely AU after What Is and What Should Never Be, some rough language, violence, angst, Drug-use, abuse, Evil Sam(maybe).

Summary: Dean is so shaken by events in What Is and What Should Have Been that he makes a deal with the cross-roads demon to change the past so that his father doesn't become a hunter and ends up in a alternate world where things are radically different, except that he alone can remember the original time-line.

Many thanks to Sioux_Sioux for the lovely beta on the story.

Dean turned resting his hip against the split rail fence separating the jogging path he was currently standing on and the fishing pond that didn't seem to actually contain any fish. He looked down the path where his father was making slow but steady progress up the hill. The older man was panting, and sweating heavily, but he hadn't stopped running. Dean smiled.

It had been almost a month since Dean had walked into this living nightmare of a world. It seemed that he could never catch a break, but he should have known not to trust a demon. When he asked for his Dad alive, for a normal childhood, for Sammy in college he had been thinking The Brady Bunch, he had gotten Nightmare on Elm Street, but that was okay. Dean could deal.

He watched as John staggered to a halt beside him dragging the hem of his t-shirt over his face. His father was out of shape, or at least he had been. Once Dean had started dumping John's anti-psychotic medicine the older man had become more focused. He had clearer recall and without the appetite suppressing effects he was at a normal weight for his height. So Dean had set about getting John back into fighting shape. They had been coming to the park every morning to run. John had bitched and whined about it at first, but now he was actually smiling at his son.

"Good job today, Dad," Dean said smiling.

He really needed to keep John at ease especially when they got around to the next bout of training exercises that Dean had in mind. He had gotten the first batch of credit cards in the mail at the post office box he had rented with one of his phony IDs. Michael Weaver had a nice credit history and he was about to buy a couple of guns.

But for now Dean was sticking to PT and getting John back up to speed fitness-wise. It wasn't actually that hard, even with the years of hard living, his father had never really looked or acted his age in the other time line, at fifty-two his father could still kick ass. Here, John had not spent the years fighting and drinking, but was also healthier, without the debilitating effects of the medications.

They finished their morning exercise and headed back to the Impala. John slid behind the wheel, looking nervously at his son. Dean smiled encouragingly.

"Go ahead, Dad. You remember how to drive."

"I haven't done it in twenty-three years. I'm not sure that I can, and I don't have a license anymore."

"Actually, I wanted to talk to you about that," Dean winced pawing through the glove compartment. "You do have a license, just not as John Winchester. For the time being we're John and Dean Porter, father and son recently out of Fort Myers, Florida."

"You have fraudulent ids?" John asked gaping like a fish out of water. Dean frowned.

"Who do you think taught me how to make them? We also have birth certificates, gun permits and credit cards."

John looked at him shocked, and if Dean had to honestly admit it, a little awed. The older man smiled.

"What kind of life have you had? What kind of man was I?"

"You were a bad-ass sonofabitch, Dad. A demon hunter; the one everybody called when the shit hit the fan and no one else could clean it up."

"You knew it was real, and you let them put me in that place. You let them give me electric shock therapy. You let them drug me out of my mind, and you didn't say anything?"

"Not me, I'm the good guy here. The other guy, the one we don't talk about, he let them do that. I'm trying to fix it 'cause those demons and shit are really out there. And we can do something about it."

"Okay, where do we go?"

Dean smiled. "Saint Francis of Rome, first off. We need to pick up a few things. We'll get some holy water, until you learn how to do it again. I've never had the knack myself. A couple of rosaries and a couple of Latin prayer books. I'm going to teach you Latin, Sammy and I were both fluent in it by the time we were twelve. You'll pick it up again."

They stopped by the Goodwill shop and Dean got John a few cotton work shirts. They were frayed around the cuffs and collars but still wearable. He talked his father into ditching the chambray button down in favor of a black t-shirt and grey cotton garage shirt with the sleeves rolled a quarter of the way up. And they dumped his sneakers in favor of a pair of steel-toed work boots. Dean grinned. He was also glad that Sammy made their dad use an electric razor; it never did more than trim his beard down to a few days stubble. Looking over at the man behind the wheel he smiled. This was his father, not that poor drugged-up sap he had first met.

They passed the sign for an Albertsons and Dean motioned for his Dad to pull into the parking lot. John parked the car and followed the younger man inside. Dean dragged his father through the isles picking up a half a dozen cans of lighter fluid and a huge box of matches.

"We're gonna start you off easy. Just a quick salt and burn. It'll be no problemo," Dean said smiling. "Got it Dad?"

"Yeah, no problem, er, no problemo, son," John frowned. "Just what am I salting and burning? I've never been diagnosed as a pyromaniac."

"Dad, keep it down. You should have never been diagnosed as anything. There's nothing wrong with you, okay."

"My doctor won a Nobel prize in psychiatry."

Dean sneered, "That doctor is a skanky-assed quack."

"Yeah," John echoed. "Skanky-assed quack."

"Dad, you don't have to agree with everything I say."

"Okay, you're right, son."

Dean sighed.

"Don't agree with me all the time. It's annoying. Let's just get this stuff. You go down that isle, get four bags of rock salt and bring them to me in picnic supplies."

"Hell no, fuck that…"

"Dad, what the hell is your problem?" Dean snapped and John flinched.

"You said not to agree with you all the time."

"Get the damned salt, Dad."

Once the supplies had been purchased and stored in the car's trunk, Dean directed John to their next stop. John nodded worriedly then pulled the car onto the freeway, heading to the older section of town near the railroad tracks. The Impala bumped over the tracks and he made a right turn into a parking lot. Dean smiled, and climbed out. John sat behind the wheel staring at the row of glittering chrome and leather motorcycles lined up in front of the rough, wood-beam building.

A green neon sign flashed above the car on a tall pole, even taking into account for the burned out R in one of the words the sign still read, Dirrrty Joe's.

John shuffled in the seat behind the wheel looking up at his son standing beside the door. With a grimace he watched as Dean tugged the handle and the door swung outward. Steeling himself John stepped out into the hot, late afternoon sun.

"I haven't been to a place like this since before I married your mother. She wouldn't let me go, and now I can't drink because of my meds."

"See that's where you're wrong, Dad. No more meds. Come one we're wasting good drinking time."

John swallowed hard, sliding up beside the younger man. He watched two bearded well muscled men of the no-neck variety walk out the door. Grabbing Dean's hand John waded to the door pale-faced, and shaking. Dean looked down at his father's fingers intertwined with his own and sighed.

"Dude, you can't hold my hand, it's not that kind of bar."

John dropped his hand smiling grimly. With a sigh John hissed, "I don't know Dean. Some of these people look pretty disreputable."

"Dad," Dean said with a grin. "You used to be the most disreputable guy in the place."

Dean parked John at the bar and ordered a couple of Corona Golds. John took the sweaty, glistening bottle and tipped it up. The cool liquid flowed smoothly over his tongue. It was crisp and cold and took his breath away, but it felt so right. He smiled, watching as Dean strutted around the pool table, and nod at the guy holding the cue.

An hour later Dean was up by two hundred bucks and John was on his fourth beer. He slurped it a little as he up-ended the bottle too quickly and the fluid dribbled over his chin. Quickly John swiped the cuff of his shirtsleeve over his face. Belching loudly he leaned back against the bar and watched as the ceiling did a sharp turn to the right.

Suddenly there was a loud noise to his left, and John turned just in time to see the large guy with a black tattoo of a bulldog on his bicep swing the cue at his son. With a snarl John leapt forward his foot caught on the barstool and he fell back hitting the bar. The stool whirled across the floor catching the guy in the thigh bringing him to his knees. Dean grinned and clipped the guy right in the temple with a hard right hook. John grinned until one of the guy's buddies took exception to the two men tag-teaming his friend and waded into the fray. John managed to duck the punch thrown at his jaw and smashed the nearly empty bottle on the friend's forehead. The guy went down like a poled ox.

Mourning the remains of his beer John staggered away from the guy he had just cold-cocked with the bottle. There was a shout from behind the bar, and John walked into a sucker punch thrown by the bartender. He cringed, yelling and spitting blood on the man standing beside him. The guy jumped back a frown twisting his face. John managed to get one steel-toed boot into the guy's instep and a knee in his groin purely by accident, and then jerked when a hand fell on his shoulder. It was Dean.

The crowd was milling around as if trying to make head or tails of the situation at the pool table, and Dean pocketed his money, threw a barstool into the center isle and tugged his father to the door.

They made it to the car just as the first faint sounds of sirens split the air. Grinning from ear to ear Dean jumped behind the wheel and cranked the engine. The Impala turned over with an impressive roar and the car hit the street long before the first flashing lights painted the twilight sky.

John was laughing uncontrollably and Dean went right along with him. He looked over at the man in the car feeling a warm sense of familiarity. John smiled at him, the first warm, genuine smile that Dean had seen, and it hit him right in the gut. His father was staring at the windshield, eyes wide, the crimson stain on his cheeks stood out like the bright stripes of a fever. Dean looked down, and then blushed himself; apparently John had enjoyed the fight very much.

Quickly Dean turned the car down Madison Avenue. He remembered the area from the few times he and John had driven through Palo Alto checking on Sammy. He hoped that things hadn't changed that much in this reality. Dean was gratified to see that they hadn't.

On the curb just in front of a worn down theater were several young women, all garishly made up and scantily clad. Pulling the car up he motioned one of the girls over. She looked to be about twenty-five from a distance but up-close Dean could tell she was pushing thirty. That was okay, his Dad wouldn't be comfortable with one of the teen-aged girls. Pulling twenty-five dollars out of his pocket he whispered in her ear. Shrugging she went around the car and opened John's door, tugging him out of the seat. He glanced over at Dean and when the younger man nodded he disappeared into the alley with the girl.

It didn't take long, and John was back at the door, face crimson with embarrassment. Dean looked over at him, and if possible his father blushed even more. Settling into the car, Dean smiled at the other man.

"Nice girl?" he asked.

John nodded.

"Yeah, very… cooperative." Glancing back as the girls vanished into the twilight John sighed. "They were hookers weren't they?"

"Does it matter? She was nice to you wasn't she?"

John blushed again. "Yeah… really, really nice. She should have a pillow in the alley; 'cause I bet her knees get sore…"

"Dad, please!" Dean hissed and it was his turn to blush.

John looked over at him a gentle smile curling his lip. Dean sighed. He cranked the window down and the radio up, and let the cool night breeze just flow over him.

Sam was waiting at the door when Dean and John got in. He took one look at John's worn, second hand shirt, flushed face and slightly out of focus eyes and screamed at Dean.

"Where the hell have you been? What have you had him up too?"

John frowned.

"I'm an adult Sammy, I can speak for myself." His speech was still a bit slurred although most of the alcohol he had consumed had worn off leaving him slightly hung-over but none the less exhilarated.

"I was talking to Dean, Dad."

John rounded on him.

"And I was talking to you, Sam."

"You have some nerve coming in my house, where I support your lazy ass and talking to me like that,"

John frowned.

"I know that Roger gave you the money for this house, and I know that he cashed in your mother's life insurance policy to do it. That was my money, my property, not part of the estate he got when he took conservatorship, the court had that set aside for me, for if I ever got well enough to live on my own. Well, I'm well enough now. He raided the bank account. You're the big shot law clerk you ask someone at the fancy office of yours what'll happen if I make an issue out if it. Whose house do you think it'll be then?"

Sam's face went white. His back was rigid, but he stepped back not accustomed to this wild-eyed stranger in his father's clothes. Dean's eyes were bright, his face flushed red and a smile crept across his lips. Sam whirled on his brother.

"You did this, you got him all riled up." Then turning back to his father Sam growled." I can't believe that you'd act like this Dad. After everything that I've done for you…"

John scoffed. "You had me locked up Sam. In some damned nuthouse. You let them give me eclectic shock treatments when there was nothing wrong with me…"

"And Dean beat you; at least I was trying to help you."

"Oh for God's sake Sammy. He beat me because you asked him to. He's different, he's changed. He took me out, got me drunk and in a bar fight and got me laid all in one night." John held up his hands in a rough imitation of scales balancing. "I'm looking at the two and from where I stand he's looking pretty good for my vote for favorite son right now."

With a grunt Sam jerked back. "It's almost one in the morning. You two had better get to bed. Don't think I won't call Roger in the morning."

John smiled wolfishly. "Do that 'cause I've got a lot to say to him."

Dean flopped down on the bed smiling. He and his Dad hadn't had a night like that in a long time. He remembered the slow summer nights of drinking and hustling pool, waiting in some back water little no-name town for another hunt to come up. He remembered the bottle of Jack Daniels resting by his father's elbow and, on some occasions, a cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth, but by the time Dean had gone to fetch Sam from Palo Alto, by the time they had gotten back together with Dad all that had passed.

Then he remembered standing in the forest behind Bobby Singer's place watching a pyre burn. Shivering Dean rolled over closing his eyes against the pain. That was then, this is now. He father was warm and alive, and more himself than he had been at the end in the other time-line.

So maybe they couldn't have that white picket fence with him and Dad and Sammy all living happily ever after. This Sam was a self-righteous asshole. Of course, Dad had pretty much decided the other one was too. And truthfully even Dean had gotten weary of Sammy's constant bitching about "normal." Normal was whatever you had, when you had it. Dean always figured.

Sighing Dean lay back, letting his eyes drift close. He and Dad had screwed up a little. Sam was pissed off. Dean hadn't wanted to try and move on until his father was a little better trained, but they could get a hotel room somewhere, lay up for a while. Maybe even look up Jim Murphy or Bobby Singer see if they were still hunting. Dean was willing to bet they were, they had been at it longer than the Winchesters. He drifted to sleep.

John finished his shower. It was late, then glancing at the clock on the bedside table he amended that to it was early. But he was far too wound-up to sleep. He had enjoyed himself tonight, and he was wondering just what that meant about him. He had always thought of himself as a meek person, afraid of everything. But he had gotten drunk, beat up a guy in a bar and had sex with a prostitute, sort of. He wasn't sure if what she had done to him technically counted as sex. This man who called himself his son, this Dean, from who knew where, was a bad influence and John liked it just fine.

Smiling he pulled on his boxers and a t-shirt. Tossing the crisply starched cotton pajamas into the hamper he sat down on the edge of the bed. Quietly John rose from his seat and bent down by the dresser pulling out a photograph album. Flipping through the book John's hand settled on a large, fading picture of Mary and him, at their wedding. He looked so young and earnest in his dress-uniform gazing dazedly at the pretty girl who would be his wife.

He quickly flipped through the other pages, Mary and him at their tiny apartment, Mary pregnant, the house in Lawrence, and finally of Dean, his first birthday cake smeared from one end of his body to the other and John laughing beside him, chocolate handprints adorning both cheeks.

His fingers fell on the wisp of blond curl fastened to the page with tape, and a picture of Dean sitting on a horse shaped seat at Gilbert's barbershop in Lawrence, his first haircut. How had that doe-eyed baby boy become the hard-case pool hustling man who had dragged John to a biker bar? Had he done that? Was he that kind of man?

The door to the room swung inward, and his daughter-in-law slipped inside. She was dressed in her nightgown and robe, bare feet whispering over the floor. John looked up a tiny, embarrassed smile creeping across his face.

"Sara I just wanted to apologize for earlier. I didn't mean to upset Sammy. Of course I won't take the house from you, and him. Annie needs a home to live in…"

Sara cocked her head, and John stuttered to a halt. Something in the young woman's face sent a chill through him. He rose shakily and backed away, wanting to get to Dean. Before he could move Sara raised her hand and John found himself flung through the air, body thudding against the far wall. He groaned as he slid up the wall arms splayed to the side.

With a grim smile Sara walked forward, her robe swished quietly in the still air. John tried to struggle, jerking helplessly as unseen hands held him suspended in mid-air. The girl shook her head as her eyes flashed amber in the dim light.

"You should have just kept your mouth shut, John. As long as you were quiet and well behaved and didn't get in the way I didn't care if you lived or died. I don't know what the hell happened, but Dean just got you in deep shit, John."

Sara raised a hand and John caught the gleam of cold metal in her slender hand. She walked calmly toward him, face serene, and slashed the knife at him. The blade bit into his skin, across his arm but she aimed poorly and the gash didn't hit his wrist. With a hiss of anger Sara slashed at John's other arm. He winced trying to cry out. Dropping the knife on the floor Sara stepped back and John dropped heavily to the floor.

In his room Dean jerked awake, he sat up straining his ears to hear what had disturbed him. From down the hall, in his father's room, Dean heard the faint babble of voices then a loud thump. He sprang out of bed running for the door.

Sara was in the hall, looking in the door of John's room. Sam appeared at the door of their bedroom looking muddled and sleepy. He watched mutely as Dean shot past Sara and ran into John's room.

His father was lying on the floor and Dean gaped. John rolled over bringing his arms up and Dean dropped to his knees. He cradled John's head in his lap screaming over his shoulder,

"Sammy, call 911!"

"Oh god Dad, this is my fault. I shouldn't have taken you out today. It was too much," Dean murmured looking back at Sara as she stood grim faced and silent in the doorway. He bent down pressing a kiss to his father's temple. Whispering he pulled John further onto his lap, blocking Sara's view.

"She did this didn't she?"

John moaned nodding, "Her eyes were yellow."

Dean stood watching as the ambulance pulled away. Sam was following the paramedics in his car. He turned, and the girl smiled. Dean felt his blood run cold.

"They're going to put him away for good this time Dean. He'll never see the light of day. You'll be lucky if they don't lobotomize him now."

Grinning she stepped back as Dean whirled on her. He raised a hand, but dropped back when his eyes fell on the door to the nursery. His niece needed her mother, for now. With a smirk he shrugged.

"Don't count on it, bitch. I'm going to the hospital. If you're here when we get back, I'm exorcising your ass back to hell. Sammy will back me up on this one. Especially when I show him what you are."

With a low chuckle Sara shot Dean a look of her own.

"Don't count on it, Dean. You're in for one hell of a surprise."

TBC


	4. Chapter 4

What Should Have Never Been Pt 4

Author: Linda Atkinson

Fandom: Supernatural

Rating: FRT

Characters: Sam, Dean, John, OCs

Warnings: Completely AU after What Is and What Should Never Be, some rough language, violence, angst, Drug-use, abuse, Evil Sam(maybe).

Summary: Dean is so shaken by events in What Is and What Should Have Been that he makes a deal with the cross-roads demon to change the past so that his father doesn't become a hunter and ends up in an alternate world where things are radically different, except that he alone can remember the original time-line.

The hospital was quiet. Dean glanced down the hall watching the four figures at the nurse's station. Sam and Roger were arguing with a sheriff's deputy and the head nurse was trying to shush them all. Dean could hear Roger's strident angry voice above all the others and it made Dean wince.

"I told you, Sam. John is dangerous, at least to himself. This is the second time he's tried to commit suicide. He needs to be back in the institution right away."

Sam balked, looking over at the deputy then tugging on his uncle's arm. Dean could see a hint of concern in Sam's face and knew it was not for their father. Sam was seriously shaken by John's revelation that he knew that Roger had raided his separate property for money from their mother's life insurance. From the way Sam was hedging getting the cops involved Dean knew that it must be true. He suspected that Sam had been part of the deal as well.

Finally the older man calmed down enough to let the deputy leave. Sam paced the floor in front of the nurse's station and Dean could hear his brother and uncle talking in low tones.

"Dean knows, at least he heard about mom's life insurance. If he goes to the courts, they'll put us both in jail. We have to be really careful," Sam said. Roger shook his hand off.

"I have all the statements from the bank account in my briefcase in my car. I'll destroy them. Unless John can actually get the judge to subpoena the records from the bank, and I doubt that he can, it'll be okay."

With a smile Dean slipped down the hall to the fire exit. He took the seven flights of stairs down to the parking structure and began looking for the car that he had seen his aunt and uncle in when they arrived at the house the other day. The dark blue Lincoln was parked in visitors parking just beside the elevator. With a grin he slipped into the shadows. It took Dean less time to break into the car than it would most people to find their keys and unlock the door.

Quickly Dean eased the briefcase out of the back seat and walked quickly away. The parking structure was dark and quiet and he was willing to bet that even with security cameras it would be hard to identify him. Added to that Dean didn't particularly care if his uncle knew he'd taken the briefcase. It wasn't likely he'd report it to the police considering it contained evidence he had committed a crime.

The Impala was parked on the street on the opposite side of the building. Walking calmly Dean strolled down the ramp and around the corner. It took him longer than he was happy with to hike the three blocks around the building, but Dean didn't want to take a chance on running into Sam and Roger.

He unlocked the car and slid the briefcase under the front seat. With a grin he pocketed his keys and used the street level entrance to go back into the hospital. Sam and Roger were both still outside the door to his father's room when he hopped off the elevator and strolled down the hall.

Sam sneered at him when Dean came to rest by the door to the room and asked,

"How's Dad?'

With a glare his younger brother made some kind of disjointed motion that Dean interpreted as an angry gesture toward their father's bed and huffed out a breath.

"How do you think? He tried to kill himself. The deputies won't prosecute though because of some stupid shit about the angle of the cuts. Apparently Palo Alto's finest think the cuts are defensive wounds. Like dad would have anyone at the house he would need to defend himself against."

Dean lifted an eyebrow at their uncle.

"Oh I don't know. I can think of a few people."

Roger flushed.

"Surely you don't believe that bullshit of John's about your mother's life insurance? You must know that all the assets that your father had at the time of the incident were placed in the estate that I manage for him."

"Is that so?" Dean smirked. "But if it wasn't, there would be some kind of separate account in dad's name, huh?"

Roger grinned "But you won't find any evidence of that. I mean there would be bank account statements and interest statements things like that. There aren't any of those things lying around."

"You're sure of that, huh?" Dean said his eyes glinting.

Roger stuttered to a halt, turning to Sam. Both men looked uneasy. And that made Dean ecstatic.

Clearing his throat Roger turned to Sam.

"I'm going to file papers with the court in the morning to have John committed to Clearview again."

Sam nodded but Dean just smiled broadly.

"I think you'll change your mind about that Uncle Roger. Just wait and see."

Turning, Dean slipped into John's room. His father was lying still on the bed, but even in the dim light Dean could see that he wasn't asleep. For a man who was supposedly so distraught that he tried to kill himself John looked incredibly serene. With a grin Dean leaned down squeezing his father's hand.

"How you doing, Dad?"

John nodded his eyes dropping closed for a moment.

"Okay. I didn't loose that much blood. She was in too much of a hurry and missed the arteries on both arms." Sighing John smiled up at his older son. "I want to thank you, though."

"For what? Almost getting you killed. I should have been more careful…"

"No," John hissed. "I felt more like a man today than I have in twenty-three years. You gave that to me, and for better or worse whatever happens from here on out I'll have that."

"Nothing is gonna happen," Dean interrupted.

John shushed him with a raised hand.

"Dean you know that Roger will have me committed again. He can't let anyone find out about him taking that money. Although God knows that no one would believe me anyway."

"Sure they would. Bank accounts have records, statements and stuff. The account that the court had set up for you for Roger to oversee has records."

Nodding John sighed and said softly, "But Roger will destroy them all, and you know that."

"No he won't. I got them out of his car. I have all the records."

Laughing John patted his son's arm. "You broke into his car? God, Dean I'm proud of you. Did you slash his tires while you were at it?"

"I wouldn't do that, I'm not that vindictive. Besides he was parked too close to the elevator and I didn't have time."

Sitting down on the edge of the bed Dean took a deep breath.

"We have to do something about Sara. If she is a demon, and I think that's likely, we need to get rid of her. The only problem that I can see is that, since Sara is her mother, Annie is also part demon. And that means…"

Frowning John shook his head.

"Sara is not Annie's mother, Dean. Annie's mother was a girl that Sam was dating. Her name was Jessica. She was killed in a fire at their apartment about a week after Annie was born. Sam got himself and the baby out but he couldn't save Jess. Sara was one of the grief counselors at the hospital where they took the baby. Sammy married her three weeks after Jess died."

Dean snorted.

"I guess that Sammy wasn't much for mourning, was he?"

"Dean, Sam was young and he had a baby to provide for…" John said quietly.

Dean held up a hand.

"Please. You never stopped mourning Mom, and you weren't that much older than Sammy when she died. On top of that you had two little kids to provide for."

"Oh yeah, look how well that turned out. I ended up committed to a mental institution and my kids were taken away. I failed you, Dean, you and Sammy both."

"It wasn't your fault. You got committed for telling the truth, because nobody wanted to hear it. Where I came from you made it Dad. You raised me and Sammy on your own and we made it okay. Maybe not great, but we survived."

John's expression didn't change.

"I wanted so much more for you and your brother than just surviving, Dean."

"Hey, you did then too, but life ain't all puppy dogs and rainbows. It's a tough world we lived in, and we saved a hell of a lot of people. Killed a lot of evil things too."

Dean grinned leaning down hugging John's neck as much as he could and not disturb all the wires and tubes they had coming out of his body. John offered his son a grin in return.

He patted Dean's shoulder.

"I'm sure that I was proud of you, Dean. Proud of the man that you are."

Flinching Dean leaned away, face going pale.

"Don't say that, Dad. God, please don't say it like that. Okay?"

John looked confused, and Dean just shrugged.

"Are you doing okay? I wanted to get you out of here, but I think its better that you stay tonight. I don't trust that little bitch to not try and get you again. I'm going back to the house. See you tomorrow."

John nodded patting Dean's hand. "Be careful Sam and Roger are really bent out of shape about all this and I don't trust them at all."

Dean walked into the house, it was almost two in the morning and the lights were dimmed. He could hear the sounds of Sara moving about in the nursery and Sam's voice in the hall. They were arguing about something and Dean would bet dollars to donuts it had to do with his father. Sara's voice was strident and angry and Dean could hear the snuffling whimpers the baby was making just under the thin thread of conversation between her parents.

Dean wondered if Sara was human at all or if she was the demon's true form. Then he began to wonder why she had married Sam. The whispered revelations that his father had hissed in his ear in the hospital before the man had condemned himself to hell rang in Dean's ears. Was Sam evil? Is that why the demon had killed his girlfriend Jessica to take her place or did this demon have a tie to the yellow-eyed bastard that had taken Dean and Sam's mother. Even in this twisted reality John had clung to that idea, that the demon had destroyed his family. Somehow things that had happened in Dean's original time-line had bled over into this alternate reality. As if the Winchesters could never have a life without monsters, a world not tainted by death and the undead.

Sam growled something at the girl and pushed past his brother storming out to the living room. Dean cast a sideways glance at Sara as she rocked the baby in her arms. She sneered at him no longer concerned with preserving her identity as a human and that worried Dean. Sara had missed her chance with John, missed the opportunity to shut him up permanently and Dean wondered what she would do now.

Carefully she walked into the nursery laying the baby in her crib. The little girl wriggled briefly before her eyes dropped closed and Dean watched silently as Sara pulled the door almost closed before disappearing into the bedroom she shared with his brother. With a final glare Dean strolled into his father's bedroom, looking at the photo album still perched on the edge of the bed.

Sitting down Dean picked up the book. He vaguely remembered the horse seat at the barber shop, remembered going for ice cream with Dad afterwards. That must have been just before Sammy was born. John was smiling, looking so proud and for a brief moment Dean felt a stab of self loathing as the image of John's bruised and battered face slammed into his mind. How could he have fallen so low as to abuse a supposedly mentally ill man? He sat the book aside scrubbing his hands over his face, not him. He wasn't the one, not truly.

Tiredly Dean lay back but knew he couldn't sleep. His father's blood was still clinging to the wall, dried in long streams down the satiny painted surface. He felt sick to his stomach, but he didn't rise. Dean didn't want to look at the dark stains on the carpet. His Dad was safe for tonight, at least, still in the safety of his hospital bed.

He must have fallen asleep because Dean came awake with a start. Something was wrong, he could feel it. Shaking his head Dean rose, confused at first as to where he was then he caught the faint trace of his father's scent on the pillows and realized that he'd fallen asleep in John's room. Pushing himself off the bed Dean staggered into the hall.

There was a bright, warm light transfusing the corridor, and it seemed to be coming from the nursery. With a frown Dean walked down the hall and pushed the door open. With a startled shout he jumped back as flames leapt out at him. The interior of the room was thick with smoke, and Dean gagged. Desperately he tugged a blanket off the dresser and wrapped it around his nose and mouth before plunging into the room. Quickly he ran to the crib pulling back the covers but the bed was empty.

Something warm and wet spattered against Dean's face and he glanced up. Sara's body was pinned to the ceiling, abdomen cut open raining blood down onto him. Dean jumped back running for the door.

He skidded to a halt outside of Sam's bedroom shouldering the door open, but the bed was untouched, the room just beginning to grow cloudy with smoke seeping in from the other room. Quickly Dean did a brief walk through checking the bathroom and beside the bed near the wall before abandoning the bedroom and racing for the living room.

Sam was there carrying Annie in him arms. Dean felt his entire body relax when he saw his brother at the door. With a smile he tugged on the younger man's arm. Sam jerked forward pulling his sleeve free of his brother's fingers and whirled. His face was blank, cold and Dean gasped even before Sam's eyes went coal black. With a sneer Sam jerked his head and Dean found himself spinning through the air. He thudded against the wall with a groan and slid to the floor. Moaning Dean tried to raise his head, but the world tilted sharply and he found himself floating down to darkness.

Dave Mitchell was driving the hook and ladder truck when the call came in. A house fire on Alabaster Lane. He hit the sirens and pulled onto the freeway. It took him all of fifteen minutes to make the run, the big truck lurching to a halt in the driveway. Dave could see another engine from the station already on the scene and an ambulance. He hoped the paramedics wouldn't be needed. But that hope died when he saw two men carrying a body out of the house.

They dumped the guy on the lawn and pulled over an oxygen tank. The guy started moving right away so he must not have pulled in too much smoke, and that made Dave feel a whole lot better.

Dean sat huddled on the hood of the Impala thinking how his life had just come full circle, death and fire in the beginning and end. He wondered just what the Winchester clan had done in the far distant past that had pissed off God so much that they just couldn't catch a break. The fire fighters had been at it for almost two hours, the house had a lot of combustible material in it and the fire just wouldn't die down.

He felt sick, briefly, when they managed to pull Sara's remains out of the nursery, the black vinyl body bag compressed far too much to hold an entire human body. But still if there was that much left of her, then the poor girl who died in that fire was possessed. Dean wondered if the demon had left her body and jumped to Sam or was his brother turning of his own accord? He had taken the baby and Dean remembered the harsh words whispered so urgently against his ear in the hospital after the accident a whole other life time ago.

Was Annie like Sam some kind of psychic wunderkind? Did the demon want Sammy and gave him the baby as an offering or did it need them both? He'd have to talk to his father. Dean flinched John wasn't nearly ready for the hunt yet, but he hadn't been the first time around either. Now tempered by years of passivity and abuse maybe his father would go into this a little less obsessed.

They would take this slow, go into it right. And they had an advantage; Dean knew where all the bastards were, without them being forewarned about John Winchester. His father had made a name killing the petty every day evil that plagued humanity. This time they were going into the big leagues right off the bat. And they'd start in Jericho just like he and Sammy had; only this time that yellow-eyed son of a bitch wouldn't know what was coming.

Right now Dean needed to get to the hospital, needed desperately to see that his father was okay. He didn't think that Sam would go there, but Dean wasn't going to take a chance.

The corridor was silent, empty when Dean got back to the hospital. The paramedics had wanted to transport him by ambulance in case he was suffering from smoke inhalation, but he waved them off. They had a mess on their hands as it was and really didn't make an issue of it. Especially when Dean had gotten into the car and pulled out of the driveway.

Dean snuck past the nurse's station and slipped quietly into his father's room. John was asleep in the bed. The steady beep of the monitor reading his heart rate soothed Dean considerably. Sammy must have just opted for leaving outright. Tracking him was going to be difficult since Dean didn't want other hunters getting wind of the fact that he was possessed and going after him.

He heard footsteps in the hall and ducked into the bathroom pulling the door almost closed. The nurse pushed a cart into the room loaded down with tiny plastic cups of medication, and clear plastic bags of fluid for the IV drips. She gently shook his father awake and cheerfully slapped a blood pressure cuff on his arm.

"Hold still Mr. Winchester, I just need to get your vitals, and then we'll change the bag on your IV, so you can get good night's sleep."

John frowned growling at her,

"I was doing just fine until you came in. How the hell do you expect me to get a good night's sleep when you come in every couple of hours and wake me up?"

She made little tsking noises at him, not at all disturbed by his grouchy demeanor. The nurse noted his vital signs on his chart and pushed a cup at him.

"The doctor wants you on something beside the Seroqeul. You'll need to take it on a regular schedule."

His father accepted the cup and tossed the pills back. Dean flinched, it had been hell watching his father go through withdrawal from the other meds; hopefully these wouldn't be so bad. But as soon as the nurse turned her back to change the IV bag John spit the pills back into his hand tucking them under the pillow. Dean smiled, way to go, Dad.

As soon as the nurse was gone Dean crept into the room. John watched him slide into a chair, and sat up. The soot and smoke clinging to his son frightened him.

"Dean, what's wrong?"

"Sara's dead. The demon decided she wasn't useful anymore or maybe because she failed. Anyway she died just like Mom. The fire was pretty much out when I left, so the house isn't all that damaged."

John nodded as if that didn't really matter to him.

"Sammy and the baby?"

Dean's chest heaved with his sudden indrawn breath.

"Gone, Sammy took the baby and left."

"Why?"

"Dad, his eyes went black. Either he's possessed or he turned, but the demon got to him."

Throwing the blankets back John tried to sit up, with a frown he said, "Then get me out of this crap. We have to get on the road looking for him."

"No wait. If you leave tonight before the police look into this Uncle Roger will try to pin it on you, say you set the fire. If you're in the hospital then they can't blame you.

Just stay put tonight, or maybe the next couple of days. You aren't ready yet anyway. I need to get some weapons together and we need to get you up to speed. We'll find him. Find them both, but you've got to trust me on this one."

John smiled, "I do Dean. I know you know this all better than I do, but I remember so many things. And I can still fight and handle a gun. Just help me out a little, I'll get it."

The door to the Roadhouse swung open and two men walked in. Ellen Harvelle looked up over the bar and amended that to the two men stalked in, like the predators they were. She knew them if not by sight then by reputation. The Winchesters, father and son, new hunters who had been making a name for themselves the past six months. She cast a lingering glace first the older and then the younger. They were trouble alright, trouble with a capital T. But damn weren't they easy on the eyes.

Her husband banged in from the back, slamming the door to the rear yard behind him with a grunt, also casting a glance over at the two newcomers. He sighed, he'd have to keep an eye on Joanne while they were sniffing around. One look at both men and he knew his daughter would have no problem bedding father or son. Then getting a good clear look at Jo's face as she slid frosty mugs of beer onto the bar he sighed, changing that to father and son, and wasn't that a bitch. Quietly he offered a silent pray of thanks when the Winchester men abandoned the bar in favor of a table, not that it would stop his daughter but it would, at least, slow her down.

The hunting community was tight-knit and closed-mouthed, but even then stories of the Winchesters had been circulating widely. The two men hunted with the precision of a wolf pack, and were just as about as relentless. They had burst onto the scene in Jericho, California, taking out a woman in white, and spread outward from there. Bill knew that they had wiped out a nest of vampires in Manning, Colorado because Daniel Elkins had called him, singing their praises as a pair of stone cold bastards who knew their shit.

The next he'd heard, they had killed a Wendigo and then some Shadow Demons in Chicago. They seemed to be searching for something. Bill was wary of getting involved; hunters with a vendetta also came with a short expiry date.

He watched as his daughter strutted up to the table father and son occupied shooting both men a toothy grin. The million dollar smile that John Winchester dropped on his little girl had her backbone melting, and Bill growled in irritation.

"Jo, take their order and move on we got other customers waiting."

She shot him a look and Bill winced.

"Daddy I'm working here."

"Working it is more likely," Bill huffed under his breath.

The son, Dean, smirked in Bill's direction. Damn it all if that didn't get Jo's attention too. Bill gave up and walked over to the table offering both men a tight smile that was rife with threat. John shot the other man an appraising glance and grinned, shrugging as if he knew what was going on.

"My son and I are not looking for trouble, just a good hot meal and maybe a little information."

Bill offered his own shrug in return. "I got the first, don't know about the second. We'll see what we can do."

The elder Winchester nodded taking a swig out of the mug, and wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

"I need some information on demons, thought you might be able to steer me on the path of someone who knew about them."

Bill flinched.

"Demons, hell of thing to be hunting. Vampires, spirits, even werewolves, they're penny ante crap next to demons. Damn things are near impossible to kill; best you might be able to do is exorcise the thing back to hell. Why you looking?"

At first Bill thought that the other man might not answer then John shrugged.

"A demon killed my wife, and they took my son and granddaughter. I want them back."

Well, Bill could understand that. He glanced at Ellen behind the bar and over at Jo who was still drooling over the Winchesters. He sighed; it might get them out of the place faster anyway.

"Bobby Singer, Durham, South Dakota. If anybody knows about demons its Bobby. You give him a call. He'll set you up."

TBC


	5. Chapter 5

What Should Have Never Been Pt 5

Author: Linda Atkinson

Fandom: Supernatural

Rating: FRT

Characters: Sam, Dean, John, OCs

Warnings: Completely AU after What Is and What Should Never Be, some rough language, violence, angst, Drug-use, abuse, Evil Sam(maybe).

Summary: Dean is so shaken by events in What Is and What Should Have Been that he makes a deal with the cross-roads demon to change the past so that his father doesn't become a hunter and ends up in an alternate world where things are radically different, except that he alone can remember the original time-line.

The house was less than impressive, and Dean wondered, briefly, if he had made a wrong turn. But the porch light was on and he could see a middle-aged man standing on the stoop. The shot gun that hung by his side marked him, that and the haunted, wary look in his eyes. Dean was becoming far too familiar with that look, every time he glanced at his father's face, every time he looked in the mirror.

Pulling the Impala into a spot on the side of the driveway he killed the engine. John glanced over at his son, offering him a minute shrug. Dean nodded. He got out of the car slowly trying to remember that this Bobby didn't know him, had never met them before. Bobby walked a few steps away from the house looking back and forth between the two men.

"You the Winchesters?" he asked stiffly. And when John nodded he relaxed ever so slightly motioning them forward. "Come on inside, sit a bit."

When they were gathered around the kitchen table Bobby handed them cups of coffee. John inhaled the rich, warm scent, bringing the cup to his lips. He closed his eyes, savoring the heat on his parched throat. Dean smiled, here or there, his Dad loved his coffee. He took a sip and watched as the other man relaxed even more visibly, even going so far as to prop the shot gun on the wall beside the table. Bobby poured himself a cup and sat back.

"Jim Murphy said you fellas were looking for a demon."

John nodded. "Killed my wife and took my son and granddaughter. We want them back."

Bobby's chest heaved in a long drawn-out sigh, but he motioned the two men towards the high piles of books on the table. By the time midnight had come and gone John had read more about demons than he ever wanted to read. Half way through one book he had lurched to his feet, and fled to the bathroom. Dean leaned against the wall outside the door listening to his father retch. A cold shiver crept along Dean's spine and once again he felt as if he had done John a serious injustice by bringing him into all this. But, considering what his father's life had been before he couldn't summon the strength of character to be truly sorry.

When John had settled back at the table looking pale and washed-out Bobby shoved a half-empty bottle of Jack Daniels across the table and a tall glass. John picked up the bottle and chugged a gulp, letting the whiskey dribble down his chin a bit. Dean looked at his father wincing.

"Ah, Dad, that might go down a little better with some ice."

John fished a few half-melted chips out of the bowl of ice on the table and slapped them down the neck of the bottle before up-ending it again. Closing his eyes John nodded.

"You're right, that is better."

Bobby watched as John settled himself down, and then pointed to the passage in the book John was reading. With a shrug he motioned to a black-line drawing.

"Actually, killing a demon is harder than hell, no pun intended. The best that most of us actually do is exorcising the thing out of its human host. Some demons actually can manifest a human form, but only the big league ones. Most of them possess a person or an animal. As long as the demon is inside the host the body functions, even if the host body is dead. That's why hunters burn their dead. Keeps something from moving into the dead body and using it again. How do you plan on taking out the demon?"

John cast a sideways glance at his son who merely offered him a minute shrug in return. Finally the elder Winchester rose going back out into the living room. He carried a cloth wrapped bundle into the kitchen placing it reverently on the wood-topped table. Bobby tugged the cloth back revealing a wooden box. He whistled appreciatively when he opened the box and saw the gleaming metal barrel of the antique Colt revolver.

"Is this the gun?"

Nodding John touched the box.

"Made by Samuel Colt himself, on the same night as the Alamo fell. It's blessed and we have four bullets left. We ended up using two on vampires and two on demons, but truthfully we only need the one."

Bobby nodded.

"I'm going to loan you a couple of books, one of them has a spell in it to summon a demon. It might make getting the bastard easier, but I can't do anything about helping you find your son and grandkid."

As it turned out Bobby didn't actually have to do anything to help them find Sam. Ellen Harvelle called John's cell phone the next day leaving him a message that a tall, young man with a baby had been through the Roadhouse and nearly killed her daughter.

Dean lay on his belly, propped on both elbows staring at the house through binoculars. He could see the tall, dark clad form of the hunter stalking through the door. The guy's name was Gordon Walker, and he had Sam and Annie inside. John was pissed off and he hadn't been the least bit hesitant about telling Ellen Harvelle what he thought of her putting the guy on Sam in the first place. But if it was true that Sam was possessed and had tried to kill Bill and Ellen's daughter Dean wasn't surprised.

His father was on the opposite side of the house, covering the rear door. Dean patted his pocket feeling for his cell phone. In the short time that he and John had been hunting this was the first time they had separated, but this Gordon was a badass son of a bitch and Dean knew that they had to be extremely careful how they handled him.

Finally though, Gordon let his guard down enough to abandon his vigil at the window and slip back inside the room. Dean rose quickly and silently, slid down the hill toward the front door. He was muttering under his breath to himself counting off the seconds so that he would hit the door at the same time his father kicked in the back door. The two of them together should be able to subdue Walker without too much trouble.

The front door caromed off the wall with a loud bang. Dean could see a sliver of light at the rear of the house where John had kicked in the door. The sound of heavy footfalls heralded his father's approach and Dean whirled just in time to deflect the wooden axe handle descending toward his head at lightening speed.

Gordon followed the downswing with a quick upper cut and Dean was hard pressed to dodge the blow. As it was he was just a few seconds too late and the axe handle scraped a raw gouge across his side. Hissing in pain he lashed out, booted foot catching the other hunter in the knee. The other man went down hard.

By that time John was in the room gun drawn and he pressed the barrel of the Glock he carried against the younger man's temple, and all the fight went out of him. Gordon sagged against the wall dropping the axe. He glared up at the two men then a smile crept across his dark features.

"You the Winchesters? Heard about you. What do you guys want with a penny ante little possessed white boy anyway?"

John dug the end of the gun barrel into the other hunter's neck making him wince.

"That penny ante little white boy is my son? Where's the baby?"

"She's safe. I've been feeding her baby formula with holy water in it. So I know she's no demon. You want the baby; I'll get her for you, but the demon boy, he's mine."

Dean grinned down at the man huddled on the floor at his feet.

"You go get the baby."

John shot him a look but a raised brow from Dean kept him quiet. Gordon rose smoothly but John intercepted him.

"You just tell me where the baby is. I'll get her."

Gordon jerked his chin toward the back room, and John hurried down the hall. His breath hitched in a sigh of relief as he saw Annie on the single bed in the small room. Her car seat was placed on the floor but she was laying on a blanket. She looked clean and well cared for, so at least the other hunter had been telling the truth about that.

A whisper of wind rattled the window screen and John paused. Leveling the gun at chest height he walked past the bed to the small window set in the center of the wall. A figure rose up suddenly, dark, vaguely man shaped and John almost shouted as it whirled, glowing yellow eyes dancing with mirth.

Dean motioned Gordon into a chair at the wood table in the corner of the room. With quick economical movements he tied the hunter's hands behind his back then secured his arms and feet to the wood frame. Once he was sure that he had Gordon bound Dean turned to the figure slumped in a second chair.

Kneeling Dean checked the ropes binding his brother's hands. He dropped the bag he was holding pawing through it for the flask of holy water and a book of prayers. Sam stirred head snapping up as the first few drops of holy water struck his cheek. A thin curl of steam rose in the air and Sam hissed in pain.

"Dean, let me go," Sam cried.

Dean smiled at him glancing at the hallway for his father. What was taking so long? Dean half rose from his crouch and shouted for his father to hurry.

"Dad, get a move on. We need to get this done."

John appeared at the door with a diaper bag slung over one shoulder and the baby tucked into her car seat. He carefully sat the plastic carrier on the floor shrugging apologetically at his older son.

"Sorry," he said, motioning to the baby. "I had to get her in the carrier."

Nodding Dean handed the flask to John watching as the holy water splattered out and soaked his shirt sleeve. John frowned.

"Don't waste it."

The exorcism went quickly, with Sam cursing and screaming the entire time. Dean kept the prayer up even when John looked pale-faced and shaken. Gordon watched from his chair tossing threats at the Winchesters as often as Sam's screaming quieted. Finally, the younger Winchester brother tipped his head back as an oily black cloud gushed out of his mouth. He collapsed against the chair back, eyes closed.

John carried the baby out to the Impala while Dean leaned Sam across his shoulder. Once they were settled he went back inside stabbing a knife into the chair arm beside Gordon's hand. Glaring coldly at the other man he snarled,

"I'm leaving the knife so that you can free yourself. If you come after me or my family again I'll leave the knife in your heart, got it."

Gordon smiled painfully tight then licked his lips.

"You can't fight it Dean. Sammy'll turn again. And you'll be the one calling me for help."

Dean smirked.

"Winchesters take care of their own. Whatever way we have to. That's not a call for you or any other hunter to make."

The car sped down the road with John huddled in the back rocking Annie's carrier. He glanced up at the back of Dean's head and then over at Sam slumped against the door.

"Dean, we need to find a place for your brother to rest for a little while. I saw a sign for a camp ground. I'm willing to bet they have a cabin or something we can rent for the night. We'll rest, get something to eat. Check over our weapons and supplies."

A faint scowl crossed Dean's face. John never mentioned the weapons unless he had to, but he was right. They were all exhausted and Sammy and the baby needed to be fed. He signaled the turn and the car bumped over the rutted road. The office to the camping area was a small wood beam building and he could see several other cabins along the road. John hustled out of the car and into the building returning a few minutes later with a key.

Leaning against the side of the car he tossed the key to Dean.

"Down the road, last building on the right."

The cabin was sparsely furnished and barely lit with a single overhead fixture. John carried Annie into the room and placed her carrier on the table. He watched as Dean hauled Sam into the room, and dumped a duffle bag containing their weapons on the table beside the baby. Carefully he rummaged through the bag pulling the Colt out and laying it on the table. Dean turned watching his father turn the gun over in his hands stoking the wooden hilt.

"Dad," Dean whispered. "Are you okay?"

Suddenly John drew a deep breath and smiled. Sam pulled himself upright moving toward the table. With a vicious glare John's head snapped around and Sam found himself slammed back against the wall. A grimace twisted his features and he struggled futilely trying to free himself.

"Dad, for God's sake what's wrong?" Dean gasped, then he was spinning across the room, back slammed against the opposite wall, shoulders pinned by unseen bonds. He groaned as he watched his father retrieve the gun then grin. John looked up, his eyes flashing yellow in the dim light.

"I can't tell you what a pain in the ass this thing has been," John said, his voice as thick and sweet as molasses on a cold morning. Grinning he spun the gun around watching as the metal glinted in the pale overhead light.

"This is so sweet. I could have killed you both at the house, killed that bastard Gordon too, but the ride over here. You not knowing what was coming, that was worth the wait. You boys had a good run, but you got in way over your head. I missed my shot with Sammy-boy but I've still got little Annie. It may put my timetable back a few years, humans grow so slowly, but eighteen years in the cosmic scene, it's nothin'."

John's big, long fingered hand trailed over the baby's soft cheek. She twitched once in her sleep but lay still. Sam jerked against the wall voice breaking with fury.

"Get your goddamn hands off my daughter."

"Or you'll do what? Shoot me. That would be a good trick."

John's hand slid the Colt closer to Sam.

"Go ahead make the gun float to you…Oh, I forgot, Dean took your psychic powers away. What a good big brother, no more visions but no more telekinesis either."

John's body virtually slid across the rough plank floor until he was chest to chest with Dean. He leaned forward closing the distance, invading Dean's personal space.

"Was getting Daddy back worth all this, Deano?"

"But the holy water splash you, back at the house," Dean gasped. John shuddered, walking toward the wall.

"You think something like that works on something like me?"

"I swear to God I'll kill you…"

John smiled.

"God's got nothin' to do with this."

John eased forward cocking his head again.

"You know what Deano…you came into this thinking that poor Johnny was so abused and mistreated but let me let you in on a little secret, in this timeline Johnny wasn't just in that mental institution because of the demon thing. See Johnny here has been a couple of french fries short of a Happy Meal a long damn time. I didn't have to slice Mommy open; I just disposed of the body. Didja know that Deano? Not everything Daddy killed in Vietnam was VC. A couple of those vampires in Colorado? Well, you should have checked them for a pulse before you let Johnny lop off their heads."

"My father wasn't a murderer," Dean cried out.

John smiled again licking his lips.

"Your Daddy wasn't…but this Johnny, you really should have thought about how screwing with fate can come back and bite you on the ass."

Dean cringed as the demon in John stepped forward again. He laughed, a low, dirty sound that chilled Dean to the bone.

"You know what? Johnny's in here with me. Trapped in his own meat suit. He says hi, by the way…He's going to rip you apart. He's gonna taste the iron in your blood, and he'll love every minute of it."

Dean groaned as John raised a hand, sliding his palm over the younger man's chest. Blood bubbled on Dean's lips and he cringed.

"Dad, don't you let him kill me."

John staggered back gasping, his head hung in shame. Suddenly Sam dropped to the ground landing with a thud. John whirled and Dean slipped down to the floor lying on this side, blood staining the rough planking beneath his still form.

"Sammy, I can't hold him. Tell Dean that what it said wasn't true. I didn't do all those things. Please…"

Sam rolled to his feet staggering to the table. John turned, eyes flashing yellow again, but before he could move Sam grabbed the Colt bringing it up. The shot rang out catching John in the thigh; blood splattered the wall above Dean. John dropped heavily to the floor. His head pitched back and he screamed as a thick black cloud ripped its way out of his body.

Moaning John rolled to his feet.

"Sammy get your brother. We need to get out of here before it comes back."

Quickly Sam jammed the gun into the waistband of his jeans and gathered his brother off the floor. John stumbled but managed to limp to the table and pick up the baby's carrier.

John watched as Sam opened the rear door and shoved Dean inside. John stumbled around the car and slid Annie's car seat inside; he climbed in the passenger side door waiting while Sam slid behind the wheel.

John moaned, lying on hand on the baby. She wailed frightened by the sudden increase in speed. John cast a glance at the rear seat; Dean was huddled against the door. He patted Annie's cheek trying to soothe her cries. Nodding over at Sam John motioned to the gun in his jeans.

"We can start over. We can find the demon again. We still have the gun and we have one bullet. If I have to I'll cut this one out of my leg, I'll do it. But we'll get him."

Sam gasped.

"Dad the hospital is about ten miles we'll make it." Glancing in the rearview mirror himself he smiled wanly at his brother. "Just hold on Dean…"

Before he could process another thought a shadow fell over the car. The sound of metal shrieking filled the air, and the steering wheel jerked in Sam's hand as a semi-truck plowed into the passenger cabin of the car. John was slammed back against the door and Sam's head contacted with the seat back. He made a grab for the handle of the car seat as Annie's screams filled the car.

The nose of the truck's cab slid under the chassis of the Impala carrying the car across the lanes of the road and into ditch. The car rode the truck's cab, until the larger vehicle bumped up against a culvert and the car spun off the cab slewing around to come to rest on the down slope of a light hill. The trucker sat behind the wheel his eyes vacant and staring into nothing.

The sound of a loud engine roused Sam, and he jerked against the hands restraining him. A paramedic was fastening a neck brace around him and he tried to push her away.

"Sir," she shouted above the sounds of the helicopter rising into the air. "You've got to be still."

"My family," Sam screamed, "My daughter and my father and brother…where are they. I need to know if they're still alive."

Sam stood looking down at his father in the hospital bed. The sight really should not have disturbed him as much as it did. He'd seen John confined most of his life. Still, knowing that his father was in that bed because Sam had shot him was horrifying.

He really didn't understand what was happening. Sam had led a sheltered life, first with his aunt and uncle and then in the closed academic community of Stanford. Jessica's death had been almost too much of a burden for him to bear so soon after Annie's birth, and then meeting and marrying Sara. The very idea that he was one of these demons that his father had raved about for as long as Sam could remember was a shock. He had taken control of his father's medical care as soon as he became an adult, and Sam had been the one to authorize the electric shock therapy. Sam had demanded Dean beat John to keep him in control. For years he had tortured his father for nothing. All that crap that Dad screamed about demons, vampires and ghosts. It was all true.

Finally John looked up at his younger son. John had been pushed so far into despair by Dean's injuries that he thought he might not be able to recover. But Sam looked like he was doing so much worse; of course, his younger son had lost a wife and was losing a child. John could well understand that pain.

Weakly he sighed rasping out a few words. "Sammy I don't want to fight anymore…"

"Neither do I, Dad," Sam said quietly. "I needed to ask you something. You and Dean, you understand what's going on? You know about these things…how?"

"Dean has books in his duffle bag; he has a book we got from Bobby Singer on exorcisms and demonology. There's even a spell in there for summoning a demon to make a deal. It's how this Dean got here."

Sam seized on that phrase turning it over in his mind.

"This Dean? What do you mean, Dad?"

John drew a deep breath.

"This life we're living, it wasn't this way before. Dean told me he made a deal with the demon to change what happened. I think I died, but he would never tell me that for sure. He wanted you to have the life you deserved Sammy. I guess that didn't happen where he was from. So he changed things for us, but he still remembered the way it was before. He just wanted it to be better."

Nodding Sam sat down on the side of John's bed.

"So you can change things? In this other life was I possessed or a demon or whatever?"

"I think so; Dean seemed to lean that way."

"But you and him, you hunted and killed these things all the time. You knew how to get rid of this yellow-eyed bastard for good?"

"I think so, but here I don't know what to do. Dean does but he's dying Sammy. And so is Annie."

"But in the other life I didn't marry Sara, didn't have Annie?'

Shaking his head John looked away.

"No. You never married."

"Get some rest Dad. I'm going to go check on Dean."

The pale figure in a ragged bloody shirt slipped quietly out of the hospital room, casting a final glance over his shoulder. He couldn't help them, didn't have the knowledge. Clearly Dean believed and therefore he could go on, do what needed to be done, except Dean was dying. Annie was laying in the hospital pediatrics intensive care unit and would be dead by morning. It was all too much. It would have been better if she had never been born. And there was one way to do that. He just hoped he had the strength of character to do what he needed to do, because they could go on without him. They could finish it. He didn't know if things would go back to exactly the way they had been, before…but he would try.

Of the three Winchester men he was the weak link, clearly unable to deal with the demons. He couldn't be trusted. The others would be stronger without him. Carefully, he lowered the duffle bag he had taken from the closet and began sketching out a symbol he had seen on the pages of the books in Dean's bag. The chalk was vivid white against the dirty gray cement of the floor. It didn't take long.

The candles were lit, guttering when the room was swept by a cold wind. The pages of the book at his feet slapped closed and he sighed. Let it happen. With a shudder he smiled faintly when the short, sandy-haired man appeared only a little taken aback by the glint in his glowing yellow eyes. He smiled.

"I'm kinda surprised to see you here. I thought you Winchesters were all done with this. A new life and all that."

"Just cut the crap, can you heal Dean? Make it so that he lives."

The demon grinned.

"I suppose anything is possible. You just giving up after all Dean did to give you the life you deserved?"

"I can't help them. I can't do this, I don't have the strength. But you can make it like it was before Dean made that deal. You can change it so that they can go on; go back to being like they were, before. Give them back the life they had."

"I can, but what do I get in return? I mean things are better off for me with you boys all out of the picture. If I change this then I will have them on my tail again. So what have you got to offer?"

The Colt appeared from under the faded gray shirt.

"I've got this. I know it's important."

"Oh you're gonna have to do better than that my friend."

With a pained smile he sighed nodding.

"Okay I want to make a deal."

The two men stood beside the grave, watching as the pyre burned down to dull embers. The pale sparks were far too simple for the task they had accomplished. Dean stood silently struggling with his tears, refusing to allow weakness to overtake him. The taller figure beside him was not hampered by false bravado, he wept freely, unashamed of grieving his loss.

When the last of the embers had faded to a dull gray, the two men grabbed shovels and worked back to back quickly and efficiently filling in the grave. It didn't take as long to cover the charred remains. The men hurried by a desire to leave this place, to go together to a hotel and yet remain alone in their grief, worked far more quickly covering the grave than they had opening it.

As the last particles of raw earth were tamped into the pit the taller of the two men staggered back hands clasped to his head, drawing in ragged uneven breaths. Dean leaned down grasping the other man by the shoulders.

"You okay?" he hissed, breath leaving a faint white wisp of vapor in the cold night air. A pained grunt was all the response he got. Frowning Dean bent down wrestling the larger man to his feet.

"Vision?"

The nod was tight but the vibration ran through the bent man's frame and Dean hissed again in displeasure.

"We need to get out of here, get back to the car. Can you walk?"

Carefully Dean shoved his arm under the taller figure's armpit, levering him to his feet.

"Come on. We need to move, Dad."

The End


End file.
